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tv   Fareed Zakaria GPS  CNN  December 9, 2012 10:00am-11:00am PST

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the terms lunatic, we should also use the term to identify those who want to continue doing business as usual around this town. >> we have no words to add to this story. thank you for watching state of the union, i'm candy crowley in washington. if you missed any part of today's show, find us on i-tu s i-tunes, just search state of the union. fareed zakaria gps is next. this is gps, the global public square, welcome to all of you in the united states, and around the world, i'm far reez zakaria, we have a very important show for you today. first up today w washington at an impasse, a conversation with one of america's greetest deal makers, james baker, former
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secretary of state, former secretary of the treasury, fovrmer white house chief of staff on how to stay off the fiscal cliff and what the party should learn from the last election. next, when the u.s. aimed high in the 1960s, we sent a man to the moon w the same effort, we can now cure cancer, that's what the head of the largest cancer center in the word, m.d. anderson says. and america has lost it's number one standing in lotts of areas, from competitiveness to education, the new number one in most cases a scandinavian country, what is the credit sauce? we'll dig into it. but first here's my take. as we debate whether the two parties can ever come together and get things done, here is something president obama could do probably by himself that would be a single accomplishment
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of his presidency, end the war on terror. for the first time since 9/11, an administration official has raised this prospect. said in a speech to the oxford union last week, that as the battle against al qaeda continues, there will be come a tipping point as so many of the leaders and operatives of al qaeda have killed or captures such as al qaeda as we know it has been effectively destroyed. our efforts should no lo loaninger -- this is the longest period that the united states has lived in such a situation. longer than the civil war, world war i, world war ii, it grants the government extraordinary authorities and effectively suspends civil liberties for anyone the government deems the minute and also keeps us at a permanent war feeting in all kinds of ways, endsing this
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situation should be something that -- james madison the author of the constitution was clear on this topic. of all the enemies to public liberty, he wrote, war is perhaps the most to be dreaded because it comprises and develops the germ of every other. war is the parent of armies from these proceed deaths and taxes. no nation could preserve its freedom in the midst of continual warfare. if you want to know buy we're in such a deep budget tear hole, keep in mind that we have spend about $2 trillion on foreign wars in the last decade. and we have the largest government since world war ii. the u.s. government has built 33 new building complexes for the intelligence bureaucracies alone occupies 17 million square feet, the equivalent of 70 u.s.
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capitals or three u.s. pentagons. of course there are real threats out there, including from new branches of al qaeda and other such groups and of course they will have to be battled and those terrorists should be captured or killed, but we have done this before and we can do it again in the future under more normal legal circumstances. it will mean that the administration will have to be more careful and perhaps have more congressional involvement for certain actions like drone strikes. it might mean it will have to charge some of the people in guantanamo and try them in military or civilian courts. but is all this bad? so we have reached the point where we might consider shifting from emergency wartime powers? well, a new report is out this week, a new global terrorism index that goes from 2002 to 2011. it shows that terrorism went up from '02 to '07 largely because of the conflicts in afghanistan,
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pakistan and iraq but has been declining ever since. the report finds the part of the world with the newest incidents of terrorism has been north america. read my column in the washington point. let's get started. he was centrally involved in historic bipartisan deals to reform our tax system, social security. james baker was ronald reagan's most important lieutenant, so who better to tell us how to get a deal done in washington today. i spoke to him at the baker center at rice university indown. >> mr. secretary, pleasure to have you on. >> thank you so much, pleasure to be with you. >> so you have been chief of staff, secretary of treasury, you know this moment, the
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president is negotiating with congress over a budget. what would you do if you were to put yourself in the place that tim geithner is or john gaboehn is, how would you play this? >> i think it's very important that the top levels of both parties are involved in the negotiation and that they get together as soon as possible. because what we really need is a grand bargain to deal with the terrible state of our economy, we're fiscally bankrupt, we didn't have the dollar, we might be greece, we have got to deal with our debt bomb, we have got to face the fiscal cliff that's coming in a couple of weeks. >> so you know what both sides are saying? the president is saying there's no way to make the math work. without raising the rates for the top income earners and that the republicans should give on this. >> yeah. >> do you think he's right? >> well, i understand that
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position, that was the position he took during the campaign. but what has to happen in my view, you've got to have everything on the table, you have to have revenue increases. now how you get those to revenue increases was an item of discussion during the campaign, and it's an item more negotiation, i for one think you can get there by eliminating and broadeninging the tax base which eliminating loopholes and deductions. the truth of the matter is that we're not undertaxed as americans, we overspend. i think everything would agree that we overspend that's why we have this debt to gdp of 100% as far as the eye can see absent policy changes, so whatever you do, you first have to agree what the level of debt to gdp ought to be. and there will be a debate about that but that will be a part of the negotiation. one thing republicans are going
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to need in this negotiation it seems to me is assurance that if they raise taxes, and once they have raised taxes, that they will in fact get the spending cuts. because in past years, they have agreed to tax increases and those spending cuts never come. >> did that happen to reagan? >> it happened in the first term -- in reagan's first term, we agreed to some spending cuts that we didn't get. it happened under george h.w. bush's presidency. so it's really important in order to engender confidence and trust, particularly on the part of the republicans that they know if they agree to tax increases, which they're going to have to do revenue increases, which they're going to have to do, that they'll get the spending cuts. now how do you get there? well you get there on agreeing on what the proper level of spending to gdp should be and
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say once it goes over that, then you'll have some sequesters or across the board spending cuts, which is the only way you're going to get congress to moderate its appetite for more and more spends because that produces votes. no's one way. the other way is if you raise taxes, as a part of a grand bargain, you could provide that those taxes would be rescinded automatically and would sun set in the event you exceeded that cap of spending to gdp, whatever it is, 20%, 21%, wherever it is, 22%. >> on the spending side, even if you were to do the kind of sequestration you were talking about, if you look at the medium term and suddenly the long-term. >> yeah. >> all of the increases in spending are essentially around health care. it's medicare and medicaid that are out of control. >> yeah, you got it. >> what would you do about that? >> you got to fix it, you got to
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you got to have entitlements tochb table because entitlements are the biggest part of our spending problem. defense has to be on the table. everything has to be on the table. you have to begin this negotiation by agreeing that they're not going to be any preconditions. everything's going to be on the table, you ought to also have an agreement that nothing will be decided until everything is decided. you ought to also have an agreement that it will be done in confidence and behind closed doors. because it makes it exthe rec d extraordinary difficult when you try to do it -- we did social security totally privately behind closed doors. >> so you think the way it's being done by the white house and the republicans is wrong? >> i don't think they'll ever get there doing it this way, they're just jousting with each other and each side is repeating its campaign talking points. you need to have a serious,
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confidential substantial negotiation by the top levels of both parties. >> you are a political animal, looking at this, the situation, what is your gut? who's going to win? >> i don't know. what we ought to be talking about is not who's going to be win, but how the country can win. look, in the short-term, if we go over the cliff, it's conceivable that people will say, oh, well, that's a republican's fault and the president won. the fact of the matter is, if we don't get this problem solved, and it's going to take leadership by the top leader in the country and that's the president of the united states, if we don't got it slves in the medium to long-term, he's going to bear the burden, because if the economy doesn't recover, people are going to hold the party in power responsible. >> we'll be right back with james baker, former secretary of
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sta state, former -- i'm going to ask him what he took from the last election and also some thoughts on foreign policy when we come back. [ male announcer ] citi turns 200 this year. in that time there've been some good days. and some difficult ones. but, through it all, we've persevered, supporting some of the biggest ideas in modern history. so why should our anniversary matter to you? because for 200 years, we've been helping ideas move from ambition to achievement. and the next great idea could be yours. ♪
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with odor free aspercreme. powerful medicine relieves pain fast, with no odor. so all you notice is relief. aspercreme. we are back with james baker, former secretary of st e state. former chief of staff, talking about, well, everything.
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i thought the election would be closer than it was. just looking at it from the outside, i thought that the republicans had a zooenlt decent chance of winning. i think the two things that defeated that was the very divisive primary we had to endure before with 22 debates and a period between the end of the prime minister season aary of the general election where the democrats were able to paint romney as something he wasn't in my view and the republican side of the screen was silent because they had to wait until they got their general election money. and then the ground game, i think the democratic campaign had probably a very far superior ground game to the republican campaign, but there's some things that i think this election tells us need to be done for my party, for us as a
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party. i think it's really important that we be seen to be the party of hope, optimism instead of the party of doom and gloom. we need to be positive and not thesive. we need to -- we need to appeal to those voter groups that we had trouble with, we need to appeal to all minority voters, in particular hispanic and asian voters. we need a comprehensive immigration plan that we can put forward. we need to have a plan on urban issues. we didn't get the votes we needed from urban areas, we didn't get the votes and don't get the votes we needed from win. we need to focus on our economic conservatism, more than our economic conservatism because a lot of those issues cut against
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us in the general election. we ought to also be seen to be the party of a strong national security, yes, but not the party of war. >> talk about that, what did you think of the primaries where, you know, even governor prom any with the china bashing or on iran, where do you think the republicans went wrong? >> i don't think they were wrong on iran because i happen to believe we cannot let iran acquire a nuclear weapon. we can talk about that later. i don't think it was substantive right to talk about designating china as a currency manipulator on the first day in office. that's not going to cure the problem. and especially since 2006 t chinese economy has risen by 26% against the dollar and that's not going to cure our trade deficit with china. we need to save more in this country and w count country and we need to get a handle on this deficit problem.
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but ronald reagan didn't get us into any wars, we had a police action in grenada, in eight years, that was it, yeah, you got to be strong, you got to maintain a strong national defense, fight against budget cuts and so forth. but unless there's a very large national interest involved, it can -- it's sometimes very counter productive to engage in some of these activities overseas, where right now, for instance, there's a lot of pressure on president obama to intervene militarily in syria, that would be the worst thing in the world we could do in my opinion. we should support the syrian opposition, politically, diplomatically, economically, but not militarily, because t t that's a slippery slope once you get into it. >> not even a no fly zone? >> i don't know, if you start a no fly zone, you got to get into
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the anti-aircraft batteries. but the government is going to fall. so i think the policy that the administration's following on syria is absolutely the right policy to follow. and i think american people are going to begin to demand more and more that there be a significant national interest involved before we engage militarily around the world. >> let me ask you about last week's news about israel deciding that in response to the palestinian declaration -- >> yeah, i think -- >> they're going to build settlements which would essentially make a con ttiguous balancing of state impossible. >> especially for israel, because israel cannot continue to be both a democratic and a jewish state if it stays in occupation of all of those arab lands. the demographics are such that that can't happen. so they're risking their status as both a democratic and jewish state. what are they going to choose?
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are they going to choose to be a jewish state in or are they going to choose to be a democratic state if this keeps on? and the two state solution, it would be really extraordinarily sad. >> u you oar the last in the administration that really applied pressure on this administration. do you think the obama administration should be trying to press israel will abstain? >> i think what the obama administration needs to do is -- you know the mideast is in chaos right now and israel is going to be affected a versely by that. what i think the obama administration needs to do is become more hands on in trying to promote arab israeli peace, peace between the israelis and the palestinians. that involved a whole lot more
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things than just settlements. and i think it was a mistake for instance for president obama in his first term to come out and make the fight on settlements. every administration in the united states has opposed settlements because they create facts on the ground that promote opportunities for peace. but it was a mistake for him to go out and say no more settleme settlements, no more expansion settlements and the secretary of state said the same thing and the minute they push back they cave. if you're going to take that position, you don't cave. but i think what's needed is a hands on approach to the peace process, arab israeli peace involving everything, not just settlements, but everything else. get the parties back to the table talking peace. it is an axiom in the middle east that if there are not peace talks going on, there will be violence on the ground. >> finally iran. do you think that the obama administration's policy, which
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is pressure, sanctions, tightening the screws as well as of course the cyber attacks, is that -- are they doing enough? would you do something differently? >> they're doing everything i think they can do and i think the policy is absolutely the right policy. they're doing things covertly as well, as you know, so you got cyber, you got coverts, you got sanctions and the sanctions are beginning to show some evidence of biting. at the e7d of the day if that none of that works, if they start enriching beyond 20%, if they kick out the iaea inspectors and go back to the weaponization program that they suspended back in, waver it was, 2006. if they of those things happen, then i think we just have to do what we have to do. because we cannot let iran have a nuclear weapon, not because of the threat so much to israel or to the united states or to our moderate arab allies in the
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region, turkey, jordan, saudi arabia. but because of the proliferation that that will cause. everybody then will have to have a weapon. they've got the capability of financially of acquiring it, and scientifically, and so we just can't let it happen. >> james baker, pleasure to have you on, sir. >> thank you. that was james baker, the formzer secretary of state, former secretary of treasury. up next, what in the world. if you look at any global ranks of the best countries to live in, scandinavia always comes out on top. why? and what can we learn from them? searching for a bank designed for investors like you? tdd#: 1-800-345-2550 schwab bank was built with all the value and convenience tdd#: 1-800-345-2550 investors want. tdd#: 1-800-345-2550 like no atm fees, worldwide. tdd#: 1-800-345-2550 and no nuisance fees. tdd#: 1-800-345-2550 plus deposit checks with mobile deposit. tdd#: 1-800-345-2550 and manage your cash and investments tdd#: 1-800-345-2550 with schwab's mobile app. tdd#: 1-800-345-2550 no wonder schwab bank has grown to over 70 billion in assets. tdd#: 1-800-345-2550
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now for a what in the world segment. here at gps we often report on how the united states has fallen behind in a number of global
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rankings. for example the economist has just published what it calls the where to be born index. in 1988, america was number one. now it is a joint 16th. three of the top five countries today from in sand navia, norway, speeden and denmark. or look at the global competitive index. the united states has fallen to seven in the latest ranks, finland and sweden are in the top five. or look at corruption, the united states ranks 19th in the comparative -- on the one hand, america has been losing us edge. but i'm also struck by the rise of scandinavia, a region that includes denmark, norway, sweden and if you broaden that definition, finland and iceland. these countries broad --
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scandinavia is actually a much more free market -- capital is allocated by the market, the government doesn't own companies, regulation is usually light, corruption is nonexistent, companies can hire and fire easily, labor moves around, but these countries do tax a lot and spend a lot. on education, child care, health, and other things. now a recent mit paper suggests that there are limits to this model. it's called can't we all be more like scan nadinavians? brief it points out how the scandinavian welfare system provides a nun of benefits, more vacations, more health care, more equality. but when it comes to innovation, the u.s. still wins, for example if you look at patents filed for a million residents, the study shows the u.s. has moved far ahead of scandinavian countries. unlike a health care system,
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which benefits people of one particular country, innovation has global impacts. new american inventions spread around the world. according to the paper's authors, skangd navyian country's free ride on u.s.'s research and development. but if the u.s. became scandinavian, it would spend less on innovation which might reduce global growth rates and thus discredit the scandinavian market. this is an important discussion. and it ties into many of the questions our leaders are grappling with. does the -- there is much to admire about scandinavia, on education, on health care, on energy. that doesn't mean that we need to become scandinavian. we are more free wheeling, more willing to take risks. but how do these companies in
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scandinavia make investments in health care. that's after all what helps people succeed no matter where they come from or how poor they are. the truth is, scandinavian countries are fulfilling a huge part of the american dream better than america these stays. now thankfully, we are still an innovation power house and we need to spend more on research and development rather than cutting those budgets. and perhaps we need to target some of our innovative thinking towards restoring the american dream of equal opportunity. that would be a truly american solution to an american problem. we'll be right back. up next, a perfect example of american innovation, have we found a cure to cancer? yo, give it up, dude!
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one out of two man will develop cancer in their lifetime. women are a little luckier, just one out of three will get it. regardless of your sex, chose are terrifying numbers. all that could change because the cure for cancer is in sight. that's what my next guest believes and he should no. dr. ronald depino is the president of the world's largest cancer center, m.d. anderson in houston, texas.
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you believe that we are at a point where we could actually finally cure cancer? >> i think we're at a major turning point in the history of cancer medicine where we have a very deep understanding of how it comes about and if it is established, how to deal with it. and we have game changing technological advances that allow us to do much better care, accurate care of cancer patients. >> what is the game changing technology? what's happened? and you say this has happened really in the last five years? >> there have been major events and what's unusual about this period in science history is that it's occurred in a narrow window and across a very broad front. so it's not one technology, it's the fact that we can sequence genomes, the entire tumor profile in a few hours for a few hundred dollars what took billions of dollars and a decde
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aid, question have the -- >> if i look at just to understand that advance in computing. you showed me a machine that now sequences dna, it's the side of a large refrigerator. that is now more powerful than, much more powerful than a machine just five years ago? >> well, that machine in nine days a 24/7 run, one machine, could exceed the data generation of all of the machines in the united states in the year 2007. >> you also talked about how computing has become just faster, but much more sophisticated. >> we're now a third generation artificial intelligence where computers can think, they can actually think in a con tech churl way which allows us to make decisions based on vast amounts of information.
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game changing. >> i think we all understand, at least i think we understand as laymen, lay people, that cancer is not one thing, so you've actually identified the ten most important cancers that you believe can be overcome in the way you just describe, either through early detection, aggressive treatment, so that they will not be life threatening. give us an example of a cancer that you believe can be essentially cured. >> i need to give you just one project and a major cancer. the 800-pound gorilla is lung cancer, we have 100,000 deaths in this country in the united states, each and every year. we have the ability to detect those cancers earlier now through noninvasive imaging. so if we screen all heavy smokers, we know that we can reduce mortality by 20% by just catching the cancer earlier. that is 30,000 lives per year. it's a significant number.
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so in order to have that occur and occur in a practical way, one needs to identify amongst the 94 million former and current smokers who should be screened. we can't screen everyone, it's not economically feasible. but if we have a risk model to say that these are the new million that are knocking at cancer's door, then those individuals can be enlisted into imaging. >> and we can do that now? >> we can do that now and in imaging, we have advances now that we can develop a test for risk assessment. in addition imaging also has another problem, in that there's a 96% false positive rate. >> just so people understand a false positive is when the test shows you test positive for lung cancer when you actually don't have it and perhaps you go through unnecessary surgery and unnecessary tests. >> so you need another test
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rather than imaging. we need another test for lung canner, if you as chief that, you get dramatic results. but it took a multidisplainary effort to think in a goal oriented way, just like the moon shots. >> the holy grail would be to trigger the body's own immune system to fight off the cancer. so that you somehow stimulate the anti-bodies in a way that that happens. are we close to that? >> i would say that that ship has already arrived. so the most advanced thinking over the last dwek indicate has been our ability to harness the power of the immune system. cancer is essentially foreign because it's different than what we were born with so it has a different genetic, so it should be recognized as different. but it's stealth from the immune system. and the investigator here, jim allison discovered how that occurs. the kacannen sir puts the brake
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on the immune system, so we develop a drug for that break, a monkey wrench for the break and we unleash the power of the immune system and 20% of patients with advanced melanoma, a very serious form of skin cancer can be cured now. >> we'll be back, we're going to figure out what will it take to actually win the war on cancer and some thoughts on our melt care system. are you getting the funding for the basic research that we need at this point? >> the answer is absolutely not. producing cleaner electricity, putting us to work here in america and supporting wind and solar. though all energy development comes with some risk, we're committed to safely and responsibly producing natural gas. it's not a dream. america's natural gas... putting us in control of our energy future, now.
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we are back with the director of m.d anderson, the largest cancer research facility in the world. we are going to talk about what you need to win this war on cancer, but also get some other thoughts as well. first, talk about what you need,
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in the last segment you explained how close we are to actually achieve this moon shot, as you called it, curing cancer for all effective purposes, or at least curing the eight most lethal cancers, what do you need to make it happen. >> to this point, our major limitations were conceptual, we didn't understand cancer enough. there are also technological limitations in our ability to profile tumors and so on. i believe some of the major barriers are educational. academia is a caldron of activities. the private sector, biotechnology and pharma have been very good at executing. i believe what we need to do is to have the two be better integrated to have academia be better able to execute so. in our program we have developed professional platforms, so that if a discovery is made, we can
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systematically convert that discovery into an end point, a new law, new educational material, a new drug or a diagnostic. >> you're looking at the possibility of actually curing cancer, you have to knowledge, new tech meteorology, computing power, artificial technology. what you need is money. federal investment, are you getting the find of federal investment in basic research that you think you need at this point? >> the answer is absolutely not. we have a humanitarian crisis, we have the ability to act on this, but we are extremely resource deplete as a community. so there's been a 19% decline in nih funding over the last ten years in real dollars. this is significant. precisely at a time when we have an increase ings dense in cancer, alzheimer's, diabetes,
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so you're on a sinking ship and what you're doing is you're trying to slow the rate of sinking through efficiencies and managing the system. >> explain to me the scale of the problem because of demographics. how many people are getting old and what does this mean in terms of these diseases that you're talking about. >> for the first time in history for who we are as a species, over the last 70 years the life expectancy worldwide has increased from about 42 to 74. by the year 2025, we will have 1.2 billion people over the age of 60. the significance of 60 is that after 60, the incidence of the great four diseases, that today cost the united states alone a trillion dollars in direct and indirect expenditures will dramatically increase, double every five years. >> so once you're 60-- >> it startses to escalate, so by the time you're 85, you have
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a 45% chance of having alzheimer's if you're a manage, you have a once in a lifetime risk of canning sir. >> and only science can solve this, because what science does is it makes it that you don't really have to treat the disease because you have detected early or you have prevented it. >> think about vaccination, how we have erad indicated -- in of. so, in cancer alone, 50% are preventable. just from prevention strategies and deal iing with proper nutrition, not smoking, sun protection and a variety of other strategies. >> can private money, can the private sector fund these kinds of advances? >> there's no question. on several levels, individuals giving gifts and contributions, very important, but also having
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a synergistic interactions with a commercial entity. for example, if we develop a drug that actually has an impact on the disease, we can license that drug to a pharmaceutical company and we get a return on the investment that we plow back into our mission. >> so, this in this atmosphere of budget cutsing and you know, concerns about our debt, what would be your message to president obama? >> it is very important for us to focus on the ultimate solution, that we've got to make the critical investments in this nation and also congress needs to understand that it's critically important that we go into an era of solutions and not simply stopgap measures. it's very important that we manage our health care system, no question, but efficiencies are not going to e get us there. we need science to drive knowledge to a point of delivering on strategies for public health, early detection
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of disease and if disease does occur, to render them eliminated as a result of effective and less expensive drugs. >> ron, pleasure to have you on. >> my pleasure. >> and we will be right back. on, home of the legendary grand prix circuit. the perfect place to bring the all-new cadillac ats to test the 2.0-liter turbo engine. [ engine revs ] ♪ [ derek ] 272 horsepower. the lightest in its class. the cadillac ats outmatches the bmw 3 series. i cannot believe i have ended the day not scraping some red paint off on these barriers. ♪ [ male announcer ] the all-new cadillac ats.
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the famous architect of brazil died in week. brazilia hasn't always been the capital. it used to be rio. it what decade did brazil move its capital?
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stay tuned and we'll tell you the correct answer. go to cnn.com/fareed for more of the gps challenge and follow us on twitter and facebook. also, remember, if you miss a show, go to itunes.com/fareed. you can get the audio podcast for free or buy the video version. either the show or our specials. this week's book of the week is david russell's "red ink." if you want to talk about the federal budget, please read this short book so you know the facts and spending and taxes. russell's single accomplishment is that it's a book about the budget and it's not boring. and now, you may have read the book ode on the grecian urn. i bet you haven't heard this ode though. introducing the ode to a well worn, rather unattractive
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jacket. this radio essay on a north korean station entitled parka of kim jong-il was a tribute to his old gray coat that the dear leader sported for over a decade. the narraterer tells about how the parka tells story. >> it will be remembered forever by the korean people. >> she also admits the jacket was threat bare and discolored, yes, it was, but not allowing those facts to get in the way, she continues that the jacket is a witness to history, telling forever about the great devotion of the patriot, kim jong-il. wow. better check your closet. what does your jacket say about you? the correct answer to our gps challenge question was c. brazilia was inaugurated in
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april of 1960. he also designed that most international of buildings, the u.n. headquarters in new york city. thanks for being part of my program this week. i will see you next week. hello, i'm alison kosik with a check of our top stories. going over the fiscal cliff could send the u.s. economy into verse. christine lagarde spoke with candy kroll crowley about how a needs to be hammered out. >> the best way to go forward is to have a balanced a i approach that takes into account both increasing the revenue, which means either raising tax or creating new sources of revenue and cutting spendings as well. >> the imf has a real interest in how the u.s. economy is doing because it will d